Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 137.djvu/566

562 that case our troops coming from Suakin could have reached Berber quite as soon as Lord Wolseley's force was actually concentrated at Korti. Great difficulties would have doubtless presented themselves, as was the case on the Nile route; but we hold that the balance was decidedly in favour of advancing from Suakin. And if the balance had been doubtful, a conclusive argument would have been supplied in favour of Suakin by the consideration that our retreat from Berber would have been secure and easy at any moment, which can hardly be said with respect to the position our forces now hold at and about Korti.

When the secret history of the matter comes to be known, we conceive it will be found that Lord Wolseley, when asked by Ministers in July last if the Nile route was practicable, replied that, judging from his Red River experiences, it was so, though at the cost of a large expenditure of time and money. We know that preparations for the expedition were delayed weeks after he gave this opinion, and we also know that he fixed the 21st of January as the earliest date on which, in his opinion, it would be possible to join hands with Gordon; and the Government then cheerfully accepted all the risks of the chapter of accidents, including treachery, at Khartoum, during that long interval of time. It would almost seem that the Nile route was chosen in the hope that the expedition might arrive too late. The reason why our Ministers were so enamoured of the river route is given, we believe truly, by the 'Observer' in the following words: –

"If our troops had crossed the desert to Berber, they could hardly have done so without constructing the long-talked-of railway. But if this railway had once been constructed, and ready communication had thereby been created between the Soudan and the Red Sea, it would have been impossible after the expedition was over to abandon to the insurgents the district traversed by the railway. To use the Berber-Suakim route was, therefore, inconsistent with the desire of the Government to scuttle out of the Soudan as fast as possible; and, in consequence, the circuitous, costly, and perilous Nile route was adopted."

A ray of sunshine piercing the surrounding clouds has come to us from our children over sea, in the offers from the Colonies to furnish troops for the Soudan; and we are glad to find that, after considerable hesitation on the part of the Government, they have been accepted – that from New South Wales immediately, the remainder conditionally. Those offers afforded our Government a perfectly unique opportunity of showing that they are able for once to rise above the mere vestryman's view of an imperial question, and of perhaps recording, as a set-off against the condemnation history must pronounce, that they laid the first stone of the fabric of imperial federation which the nation has so much at heart, but which, up to this time, has obtained no more consistency than "the airy fabric of a dream." The quality of Canadian soldiers is known and appreciated already. In 1878, when war with Russia was imminent, our General commanding in Canada was commissioned to raise a strong Canadian division for service in the field. The Dominion Government was ready to promote that object, and 10,000 men could easily have been obtained, had the turn of events not rendered it unnecessary. As for the Australians, if their prowess in the cricket-field is any measure of their behaviour